And with that, the first FMQs of 2022 comes to a close.

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The first minister says there has been a "positive dialogue" between the Welsh Government and Chester City Football Club, after it was accused of breaking Welsh Covid rules. However, Chester has confirmed that its home fixture on Saturday has been postponed.

More generally, Plaid Cymru's Llyr Gruffydd called for Mr Drakeford to "consider raising the maximum number of supporters so that grassroots sports can operate, and in the case of larger clubs, for some percentage, perhaps a third or half the capacity of the stadium, as long as social distancing and mask wearing is in place".

The first minister replies "we're eager to review the number of people who can meet in the open air and do things such as supporting those clubs that are so important to them. But the time to do that in Wales is when the medical advice, and the other advice that we receive, tells us that it is safe for us to do it."

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Asked about the most equitable way of assessing the quality of learning at the end of key stage 4 and key stage 5 in light of the Omicron wave, the first minister says "examinations are an important corrective to unconscious biases in the system. We know that working-class young men particularly do better in exams than sometimes their teachers had anticipated. And that's why it is very important for us to have examinations as part of the way that young people will be assessed in Wales this summer."

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The welfare system is "notoriously complex" says the first minister, "the more you try to fine-tune it to be able to help people with different parts of their lives, the more complexity tends to get built into the system".

He renews his criticism of the end of the Universal credit £20 top up.

When the Covid pandemic hit, those on Universal Credit were given an additional £20 per week "uplift" to help them through tough economic times.

The additional payment ended on 6 October.

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On proposed changes to cervical screening timescales, the first minister tells the Labour MS for the Cynon Valley, "I entirely share the frustration of Vikki Howells at the way that a success story was communicated in a way that caused such anxiety to so many people, because the screening system in Wales is a success story.

"We were the first part of the United Kingdom to change our screening system to a more sensitive test for cervical cancer in 2018. We've had vaccination for HPV amongst young women since 2008, and the risks from cervical cancer in the years to come will be very different, and much lower, than they were for so many people in the past."

Women and people with a cervix, aged 25 to 49, will now be routinely screened every five years instead of three.

Public Health Wales apologised for causing "concern" over how it explained changes to cervical screenings.

Image source, Getty Images

Plaid Cymru leader Adam Price says "when the global financial crisis hit, the Welsh Government then convened an emergency economic summit to pool ideas on what we in Wales could do independently ourselves to respond."

He calls on the Welsh Government "to consider convening a Welsh social summit to help devise an urgent cross-Government response to the cost of living crisis facing people and families in 2022".

The first minister responds, "across the Welsh Government, we are already taking action, whether that is the £51 million household support fund, which will offer help with fuel bills to families in Wales this winter; with our commitment to the council tax reduction scheme, 60 per cent of households in Wales get help through the council tax reduction scheme; through the millions of pounds additional that we have put into the discretionary assistance fund; and through the actions that we are taking through our single advice fund to make sure that people in Wales have the help they need when they claim the things to which they are entitled."

Andrew RT Davies, leader of the Welsh Conservatives in the Senedd, says some Welsh Government restrictions "do not seem to make sense".

He calls for a roadmap out of the restrictions, from ParkRuns - which decided to cancel their 5k events in Wales from 1 January onwards as no more than 50 people would be allowed to attend - to the Six Nations championship.

The first minister replies, "all the actions that the Welsh Government takes are those recommended to us and endorsed by our clinical and scientific advisers.

"This is a Government that follows the science, does not spend its time trying to pressurise scientists into giving us advice that will be politically convenient for us.

"Nor do I agree with him that it is practically impossible to do some of the things he said; I see many, many people running in the park in organised groups within the current level of protections. 50 people can get together with 50 other people helping to organise themselves into such activity, and many, many people are taking advantage of that."

He adds, "next week will be the end of a three-week review period. If we are very fortunate, and it's a very big 'if', and we find that we have passed that peak and we are on a reliable reduction in impact of coronavirus upon us, then we will look to see what we can do, as I say, to relax some of the protections that we've had to put in place."

Mark Drakeford says it’s unclear whether recent figures that appear to show a decline in the number of Covid cases are “genuine falls” or a result of fewer people going for PCR tests because of recent changes which no longer require those receiving a positive lateral flow test to follow up with a PCR test.

He says even though they were showing a decline the figures were still “astronomically high” and that it would take “a few days yet” before it’s clear whether they represent a genuine downturn.

Responding to Conservative Natasha Asghar, First Minister Mark Drakeford says "staffing levels in A&E departments in Wales, at their complement level, are not unsafe—of course they're not; they meet the different Royal College requirements."

He adds, "at the moment, because of the Omicron variant, we have significant proportions of staff in the NHS, and other public services in Wales, unable to be in the workplace."

Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the first session of First Minister's Questions of 2022.

The meeting is being held via videoconference.